Mexican Food – Teotihuacan

One of the easier cuisines to find in Taiwan, old timers such as Crispy Pete and Det. Mickey String recall being able to get low quality-ok Mexican food way back in the era when TV was called books, nobody locked their doors and everyone queued up for up to four hours to marvel at the zoetrope at the traveling carnival. 

Nowadays there is even more Mexican food, and for some reason most Americans see themselves as experts on it, in quite the same way a significant number of Britishers claim to know everything about Indian curry (as I said last time something like 90% of curry available in the UK is actually Bangladeshi). Personally, I could always take or leave it. When I was still living in the UK, it wasn’t a big thing.  I’ve eaten tacos, enchiladas, guacamole, nachos and all that, but it never really did anything for me. There was always one dish I wanted to try having seen it regularly on travel/cooking TV shows and in kids’ ESL (English as a Second Language) books:  mole. In kids’ books it is usually introduced as “And in Mexico, they cook using chocolate! Isn’t that crazy? “, and cooking shows take the line of “Cooking with chocolate, don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it”. For some reason me and mole had never crossed paths, and I never thought I’d get the chance until I noticed it on the menu at Teotihuacan. I was actually going to go to their sister restaurant Tenochtitlán which specializes in vegan cuisine today, but my lunchtime guest forgot that today was a government mandated workday to make up for an upcoming national holiday. It is a shame because I haven’t seen Lobster Johnson for ages; he lives high atop Lion’s Head Mountain in his Sanctuary of the Damned, and has become something of a bearded mountain man.  As he is a vegan, I decided that Tenochtitlán could wait for another day. I’m also broke, so by using the coins in my spare change tin to get through this task I set myself, I wanted my Mexican restaurant visit to count in my quest to find less common stuff.

Teotihuacan, which is a real pain in the behind to spell (thank gawd for copy and paste), is located in central downtown, in one of the more expensive areas close to Zhongxiao Dunhua MRT. I was the first customer of the day, though I was later joined by a gaggle of “ladies who lunch” who were ordering expensive cocktails and ordering food like it was going out of fashion. Not uncommon for the area. The restaurant is a nice space, lots of Mexican bric-a-brac on the walls, old black and white movie played on the walls. A running theme across all these restaurants I’ve visited. Very pleasant place to find yourself, and the prices seemed good on the other dishes (though not a particular fan, everything did look good).

So, I ordered chicken mole enchiladas at 450NT. Visually, I would never say it is the most impressive dish I’ve seen, and I wish I could agree with classic reggae band The Gladiators when they sang ”Looks is Deceiving” . I’m still, a few hours on, trying to work out if I liked it.

Portion size was fine, the chicken and rice were fine, but that sauce… hmmm, definitely an acquired taste.  There is still an aftertaste and I’m trying to put my finger on what I could compare it to. It’s not chocolate like we would know it, it has a spice thing that doesn’t really go anywhere and just… yeah. The best image I can think of to describe it would be that curious dinosaur meme that was going around a few years back.  I want to know what it is that it tastes of and if I enjoyed it or not. All I can say is that it is a puzzle.

I’m not knocking the food, once again this is my experience of a food I’d never had before and I was willing to give it a go. Everything about the place suggests it is a very high standard, people whose opinions I rate have all enjoyed themselves immensely, and as I said earlier the more conventional choices on offer (to a non-Mexican palate) looked great. Not sure I’ll try mole again though, now I’m just confused. Like if you pressed “up” in an elevator and then went down.

So I’m down for going to Tenochtitlán in the future, and I’ll come back here for sure, it looks like a place the Bao family would enjoy, and very easy for us to get to.

But hey 37 out of 52 done! I’ll update when I can!

Thanks for your support.                  

Menu

Chicken mole enchiladas 450NT

Address: No. 9, Lane 21, Section 1, Anhe Road, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106

Nearest MRT: Zhongxiao Dunhua MRT